Unless otherwise indicated herein, the materials described in this section are not prior art to the claims in this application and are not admitted to be prior art by inclusion in this section.
Light detection and ranging (LIDAR) devices may estimate distances to objects in a given environment. For example, an emitter subsystem of a LIDAR system may emit near-infrared light pulses, which may interact with objects in the system's environment. At least a portion of the light pulses may be redirected back toward the LIDAR (e.g., due to reflection or scattering) and detected by a receiver subsystem. Conventional receiver subsystems may include a plurality of detectors and a corresponding controller configured to determine an arrival time of the respective light pulses with high temporal resolution (e.g., ˜400 ps). The distance between the LIDAR system and a given object may be determined based on a time of flight of the corresponding light pulses that interact with the given object.
The detectors of such a LIDAR system may include one or more photodetectors. Such photodetectors may be especially sensitive detectors (e.g., avalanche photodiodes (APDs)). In some examples, such photodetectors may even be capable of detecting single photons (e.g., single-photon avalanche diodes (SPADs)). In some cases, such photodetectors can be arranged (e.g., through an electrical connection in series) into an array (e.g., as in a silicon photomultiplier (SiPM)).